Flowing into Spring
My favorite lesson of Spring is flow—remembering that we do not have to do anything but allow Life to flow through us. As I face a beautiful and terrifying season of my life, I'm embracing hope.
ATTENTION HERETICS:
Our Heretic Happy Hour is this Wednesday, March 19 at 5:30 PDT / 8:30 EDT.
Link at the bottom of this post. Hope to see you there!
Surrendering to Spring
As the snow melts and the rivers rise, the sap wakes and the sun shines…
The lesson of spring in trickling streams, in tiny shoots, and warm sunbeams…
… is flow.
Everything that has been still—begins to wake.
A tiny quiver, a daring shoot, a rapid break, a quiet float.
The movement of spring is drastic and gentle at once… sudden ‘midst the Silence of Winter, yet deeply longed for from the depths of the Soul.
My favorite lesson of Spring is flow—remembering that we do not have to do anything… only allow Life to flow through us.
All around you, beneath the surface, the world is beginning to stir. If you listen quietly to the deep stillness of your body, you will feel your own quickening.
As spring approaches, I grudgingly wake from my winter stupor of in-turning and deep diving. I divest myself of the blankets which have been snuggled up to my chin all season. Soon, I will even abandon the warm mug, which has been my constant companion through these snowy days and long nights. I can feel my body longing to unfurl, even while my mind and heart wake slowly into the coming season.
At the end of April, I will be leaving for six weeks to guide my final Ancient Mystery Quest in the sacred South of France.
I had dreamed of spending a quiet month writing in the Pyrenees before the tour begins (doesn’t that sound amazing?)… but it seems that Life has other ideas for me.
An epic trip appears to be planning itself—filled with my own sacred adventures, researching hitherto Unknown histories, and a lot more work than simply writing my days away in a cottage in the mountains.
Our itinerary so far includes…
🙏 A pilgrimage to Lourdes with my mother and daughter.
♥️ Re-exploration of Mary Magdalene’s sacred sites in Provence, where it feels like we’re being called to work with the land to recover the ancient link with Magdalene energies that has been suppressed by the Church.
📖 Making connections with local book shops, museums, and corner stores for ongoing book sales once I’m no longer returning annually to France.
🌍 Research into hotels, B&Bs, restaurants, and hidden gems off the beaten path for my Sacred Mystery Tours sacred travel planning company.
And the most frightening of all…
⭐️ Deep research into The Martyr—the sequel to my epic historical vision book The Heretic about the real secrets our ancestors hid in the sacred South of France.
Right now, on the cusp of spring… it feels like a lot!
Obviously, this is a very exciting trip, and I trust that I will be ready when the time comes, but from right here—still snuggled up with my warm mug—it is hard to imagine being someone who can do all of that.
The beautiful news—when I choose to re-member it—is that I don’t really have to.
My job is just to show up… to be willing… and to bring all of myself to the adventure.
The rest is up to Godde.
The reality is that I can’t make these plans happen any more than I can wake the bears or cause the rivers to flood.
Transformation, gnosis, and miracles are above my pay grade.
I can visit Lourdes, bring offerings, and cultivate a pilgrim’s heart of longing and humility. But I can’t synthesize sacred experience—I can only be open to it.
Likewise, there’s no way to plan to stumble across the information I need for my book. I will either be led to uncover hitherto undiscovered ancient secrets—or not. Frankly, it’s terrifying to consider how little control I have over that, but if I’m called to write this book, then the puzzle pieces I need will turn up.
It’s easy to feel confronted about writing my next book.
The biggest problem is that the first one was good… really good—it’s a tough act to follow.
And it feels as if I’m embarking on it alone—
My wise old history buff writing mentor is dead.
My amazing cultural anthropolgist editor is dead.
My encouraging and lovable publishers went out of business.
Over the past few years I’ve felt more than a little lost, sorry for myself, and plain old not-good-enough to begin the next book. When I finally started writing again last summer, it was painfully slow, getting up in the wee hours of the morning to sneak in a few hours of work in before my little one wakes.
But more and more lately…
The thread of research is following me through the landscape of my life. The characters are talking to me, begging me to tell their story.
The Martyr is rising… and I must rise to meet it.
Here on the eve of Spring—like the sap waking in the trees—the imbas (poetic inspiration, Divine vision, and Gnostic Wisdom in the Irish tradition) is waking me to an Unknown season.
I neither feel ready nor able, but that does not matter.
I am willing.
Willing to be used by a Force Greater than I am. Willing to flow into whatever I’m called to do.
My job has always been simply to show up at the blank page. To become the empty, fertile womb where ideas are conceived. There is no manual for how to do this work, but I know what it feels like in my body—thrilling and terrifying at once.
I pray for grace and ease, for in the past this posture has often left me wracked… wrecked… famished… feverish… throttled… traumatized… obsessed… exhausted.
Yet every year, I grow stronger in surrender, more graceful in getting out of the way. I dream that someday, the process leaves me whole and healthy, feasting and fulfilled. Perhaps today. Perhaps tomorrow. Perhaps someday soon.
Spring is a season of hope.
For now, I will become a gardener of hope—Seeing the life I hope to live and praying to be gently held by whatever Spring’s equivalent of this cozy blanket might be.
Tomorrow is our monthly…
Heretic Happy Hour
Wednesday, March 19
5:30pm PDT / 8:30pm EDT / 11:30am AEDT (+1 Day)
Bring your favorite brew for an hour of magical inspiration and exploration of our deepest longings with kindred spirits in a safe-to-be-yourself space.
This month’s theme is:
🌲 Natural Belonging 🌍 ✨
Our sense of belonging arises out of a resonant field created when we are deeply ourselves in community with others who See, accept, and appreciate the gifts that we are. Together, we’re exploring the deep ways we are connected to the world around us and how we find each our place in the Great Pattern.
In this community of like-hearted Heretics, you’re invited to experience belonging through an exploratory co-created conversation. We’ll explore what it means to be deeply a part of the natural world, how we—as humans—tend to separate ourselves, and how to create and experience belonging in our lives.
Google Meet Link:
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